Networthy ND 19

Published: Oct. 25, 2011

You can’t say ND people don’t have wide interests. The fate of Western capitalism, the specter of a drone world war, how to predict stock prices by using Google, and what happens if we meet an unfriendly E.T. are among the issues ND folk weighed in on at various websites recently.

Drones gone wild? The implications that drone aircraft attacks have for war and peace have been on the minds of fellows of Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for international peace studies. ND Law Professor Mary Ellen O’Connell recently commented on their use in the assassination of al Qaeda leader and American citizen Anwar al- Awlaki. In an opinion piece published by CNN, O’Connell argues that the drone attack was immoral, unconstitutional and dangerous. The law professor previously has made the case that U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia were violations of international law.

In an interview on the PBS Newshour, Professor David Cortright echoed O’Connell’s legal/moral concerns and on the CNN website, Cortright discussed the dangers of global drone warfare, with more than 50 countries developing drone fighting capability.

On the BBC program Business Daily, ND economics Professor David Ruccio participated in a discussion with Andrew Biggs of the American Enterprise Institute and German economist Matthias Schaefer on whether Western capitalism has failed given the current problems of economies worldwide.

And on Fox Business News, ND business professors Paul Gao and Zhi Da were interviewed regarding their recent finding that stock prices might be predicted by tracking the frequency of Google searches for the stock offering in question

The Museum of the City of New York is featuring an exhibit of World Trade Center photos by Notre Dame alum Camilo Vergara ’68. Vegara received a MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant in 2002, recognizing his life’s work of photographically documenting the inner cities of America. The New York exhibit will be up until December 4. Vergara’s work, which has been featured in The New York Times, can be seen on PBS, as well as in Domus magazine and Time magazine’s Light Box.

In his New York Times Opinionator blog, ND philosophy Professor Gary Gutting muses philosophically about what might happen if we ever meet E.T. face-to-face and he turns out to be a not so nice guy.

Finally, if you like your detectives hard-boiled and your mysteries noir, you might want to check out a DVD of Red 71, a film produced by ND alum and adjunct professor Brian McLaughlin, class of ’82. McLaughlin produced the murder mystery that features a gumshoe named Shane, a beautiful and calculating femme fatale named Lorain, and an anonymous desert town which is “home to a web of dangerous relationships.” You can view a trailer for the film; read a a review or check it out at Netflix.